Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 2:30 pm on 17 March 2020.
Members will have seen a letter today from the First Minister to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and we know that the Chancellor is making a statement this evening on financial support for businesses and the economy during this period. But would it be possible for us to have a statement or a debate on these matters? I think many of us have been concerned for many years that the financial structures holding together the United Kingdom are broken and that they're not delivering equality and fairness to all parts of the UK equally. We've seen what I think is some really impressive leadership in different parts of the world, certainly from Macron last night in France, putting together a very comprehensive package, which I hope the UK Government will have taken notice of.
But we're also aware and particularly what this crisis has crystallised for us and has brought into sharp focus is that Barnett is no longer fit for purpose, and that if the UK Government continues to use Barnett in order to distribute funding across the United Kingdom then we will suffer disproportionately as a consequence of that. We've also seen the Treasury making differential announcements for England, and then a considerable time before those announcements on funding are made for Wales. There is a need for the United Kingdom to work together as never before, and I am deeply concerned that the financial structures of the United Kingdom in some ways inhibit this working together rather than promote it.
So, would it be possible for us to have a statement or a debate, following the news from the Chancellor of the Exchequer, to enable us to understand what that means for Wales, the response of the Welsh Government, but also, I think, more crucially, how do we address the broken financial structures that are no longer serving the whole of the United Kingdom equally?